


For Better Or Worse

by raendown



Series: NaNoWriMo 2020 Drabbles [11]
Category: Naruto
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-16 18:20:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21275627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raendown/pseuds/raendown
Summary: Some hurts have easy solutions. Others don't. But they always have each other.





	For Better Or Worse

“I said I’m fine, damn it, just leave me the fuck alone!” Madara's words echoed through the house almost louder than the slamming of the door as he crashing through it, feet stomping and face red with anger. Behind him Tobirama caught the door on the backlash and closed it with icy calm.

“You’ve never been particularly good at gauging your own emotional state,” he said.

Madara snarled at him. He spun around and stormed away but only towards the living room where he began to pace around the kotatsu in a wide circle as he so often did to burn off some angry energy.

“They’re my emotions and I’ll feel them however the hell I want to!”

“I never said you had to feel anything but what you do.”

“You just said I couldn’t!” Madara spat back without pausing in his steps.

Tobirama sighed. “No, I said you’ve never been good at understanding exactly what it is you’re feeling and why. I said nothing about whether your feelings were wrong or not allowed in any way.”

“Just fuck off, alright?” Both hands balled in to tight fists at his sides. “I will say it one more time: I. Am. Fine.”

“Madara, don’t lie to me. Don’t tell me you are fine when you are not. I thought we were past the point of acting like strangers in front of each other.”

Finally Madara stopped his pacing, turning to his husband with a stunned expression. He really hadn’t expected that. Especially not in that ice cold calm that Tobirama only used when he too was aching on the inside and clinging to calm with an iron grip. It had never occurred to him that he might be hurting the man he loved by pulling inside himself like this. From the other’s perspective he supposed it probably did look like pulling away.

It took effort to unclench his fists enough to drag fingers through his hair, struggling to breathe around the lead in his chest, but Tobirama was right. He was lying. And he wasn’t fine.

“Sometimes…it gets to me more than others…how much Izuna still hates you,” he admitted in a very small voice. “You are both so precious to me and sometimes all I want is all of my important people in the same room so I can see all of you happy and know that everything’s okay. And the fact that he can’t even last through one dinner without starting a fight like he did tonight…it hurts.”

“I thought it might have something to do with that,” Tobirama murmured, daring to come closer and reach out with one hand. He waited until Madara nodded before coming closer and pressing their foreheads together.

“He just doesn’t get it. You make me happy. It tears me to shreds that he can’t just let me be happy.”

Tracing the sides of his face, Tobirama leaned in a bit closer. “We’ll figure this out. There must be some way to make him understand the pain he’s causing you. If worst comes to worst we’ll shove a Yamanaka inside his brain and figure out exactly what it is about me that he still hates so much. We would at least have something to work with.”

Madara laughed at the thought and it was a watery sound but a good one. If he could laugh then the emotions were running their course and he would feel better after a good sulk and a nice long cuddle.

“Tea?”

“You think tea is the solution to everything.”

Tobirama arched a brow. “Does that mean you don’t want any?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You offered tea, you can’t renege on it now!”

With a hum Tobirama pulled away, paused for thought, then ducked back in for a quick kiss before turning for the kitchen. Madara followed with noticeably quieter steps than the thundering he’d been doing when they first arrived home. Things would be alright in the end. He had to believe that. Life hadn’t given him very many good things but Tobirama was absolutely one of those good things and no way was Madara going to let one little brat with incessant hissy fits take that happiness away from him.


End file.
